First Family Trip to WDW! Lots of memories and magic in just 4 park days, May 2014

[winifred]

Our first trip to WDW was wonderful! As a newbie WDW vacation planner, I came to rely on these trip reports to help me plan our vacation, develop our strategies, and glean advice from others... I hope this report helps someone else too!

Let me first introduce myself & family:


I have a very easy going husband that let me plan this vacation to my heart's content (and then some). With us are our two fun-loving, energetic, lovable daughters, ages 7 & 3. My oldest daughter had her birthday the first park day of our trip! Our youngest loves all the Disney princesses, and liked the 'other' characters only from a distance (you will see a lack of photos of her with Chip & Dale, Pooh & friends, etc). Oh well, gives us an excuse to return someday when she feels comfortable around them.

My mom joined us on this trip! Thank goodness for Mimi! She and Memory Maker photographed this trip. Here we are all together:



Some particulars of our trip:

When: mid-May, 2014
Where: stayed at Yacht Club, 4 days, 5 nights
Why: to celebrate my oldest daughter's bday, to celebrate surviving a harsh Maine winter, and to celebrate our first family vacation!

 

[winifred]

Although I had been planning the vacation for months, we decided to wait to tell the girls until we were 30 days out. This would give them time to learn about our trip, let them warm up to the idea of traveling on a plane (it was their first time), and let us avoid months of 'so, when are we going to Disney, next week?' questions. Given the momentous occasion, I wanted to do something special and, with the help of pinterest, made a countdown 'calendar'. Ours was made of paper rings, some made to look like Mickey Mouse. Inside each ring, I taped in a little Disney factoid (ex: did you know Disney is the most visited attraction in the world?), a question (Who is your favorite Disney character?) or a tidbit about the YC (The pool at our resort will be just like being at the beach). This was so much fun for the girls, and, despite taking extra time to do, was so worth it! We would even reveal surprises along the way, like telling them about a special ADR.

Given some reported issues with FastPass+, I did not tell them about any M&G that I had booked! We did not experience any trouble (well, one slight glitch that I will reveal later, but was not a result of Disney error), so those events were revealed on that particular park day.

Without further ado, here is the calendar!





It was like Xmas morning when the girls found it, my oldest daughter jumped up and down and screamed 'We are going to Disney?!?!'. My youngest, though, just walked past it and realized what was going on based on her sister's reaction.

 

[TigersLions]

Congratulations on your first family vacation and here's to many more!!! Love your countdown chain!!

 

[winifred]

Congratulations on your first family vacation and here's to many more!!! Love your countdown chain!!

Thanks! I think a WDW addiction is forming as I am already thinking about our next trip!

 

[LovesTimone]

What a cute family you have. Great count down chain.. Really gonna steal that idea.
Looking forward to your report.

 

[winifred]

Part 1/2:
Day 1: Animal Kingdom

We are early risers, so getting to parks at rope drop isn't an issue for us. We arrived at AK by 8:35 for a 9:00 opening, here's where we waited:



Not bad! I'd like to point out that a family on our same bus was at the very front of this line, we took our time walking in and that extra 10 minutes made quite a difference.

Upon making our way into the park, we headed straight to the safari! I didn't book a fastpass+, knowing we were going to go immediately there. My heart sank when I saw the line forming, but a cast member assured us we would just walk on, and we did. Once the line starting moving we meandered our way right to an open truck. Phew.

The safari was amazing. We saw so many animals, the giraffes were so close! It was spectacular. We sat in the very back, which was nice, because we could turn around and have an unobstructed view.




We then made our way to the train to conservation station / planet watch / affection station. There, we met Chip & Dale!



We then made our way to lunch at Flame Tree BBQ. It was very good, though I wished I had ordered ribs instead of the salad. Tip: walk along the path to get to a nice seating area the looks out onto the water/Everest.

Watching Everest, my daughter who is 7 and has never been on anything scarier than a ferris wheel, was adamant that we go. So we did. Oh. My. We waited 35 minutes to scare her to death. She didn't cry, but quickly exited once we were done and said 'that was terrifying and I never want to do it again'.

We still took a photo to commemorate us surviving Everest!



We then had to run to our first fast pass+, a m&g with Mickey & Minnie!

While we were on Everest, Mimi had taken my 3 year old to meet them, one blessing of the hour window of fast pass+.

 

[winifred]

What a cute family you have. Great count down chain.. Really gonna steal that idea.
Looking forward to your report.

Thank you!